Tag: Ray Daves

This week The Spokesman Review published a special keepsake section commemorating the 75th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. For the past nine years, I’ve been interviewing Pearl Harbor survivors for newspaper and was pleased to have many of those stories included.

In addition I wrote the following piece describing what it meant for me to visit the place I’d written about so often.

Never forget.

Cindy Hval, who wrote “War Bonds: Love Stories From the Greatest Generation,” visited Pearl Harbor in March. She explored places she had learned about in nine years of interviewing Pearl Harbor survivors.

Stretching out, I pressed my cheek into the hot sand, its gritty heat almost too much to bear. Closing my eyes, I imagined the shriek of airplane engines and the spitting sound of machine gun fire hitting the beach, while the air around me burned.

I covered my head with my arms, and could almost hear the whistling sound of bullets whizzing past my ear.

A shadow loomed. “Are you okay?” my husband asked.

Slowly, I sat up and scooted back onto my brightly-colored beach towel.

“Just thinking about Nick,” I said, while I slipped on my sunglasses.

The beauty of being married 30 years is I didn’t have to explain what I meant.

Derek and I visited Oahu in March to celebrate our anniversary, but the trip was part pilgrimage for me. After nine years of interviewing Pearl Harbor survivors, I was at last visiting the place I’d written about so often.

Here on Waikiki, I was just 12 miles away from Hickham Field where Nick Gaynos almost lost his life on Dec. 7, 1941.

Nick Gaynos holding the piece of shrapnel that landed near him while under fire during the attack on Pearl Harbor 75 years ago. Gaynos died 20 days after this March 11, 2015, photograph. (Courtesy Cindy Hval)

During the attack on Pearl Harbor, Nick had been running toward his duty station when a Japanese pilot targeted him. He’d told me of looking up as he ran and seeing the grin on the pilot’s face as he fired at him.

Nick hit the beach and covered his head with his arms as the bullets flew. When he got up he discovered a large piece of shrapnel next to him.

“I grabbed it,” he said. “It was still hot from the explosion.”

When my book “War Bonds: Love Stories From the Greatest Generation” was released, Nick attended a reading at the Coeur d’Alene Public Library in March 2015. He brought that piece of shrapnel with him. It was jagged and more than 2 feet long. He died a few weeks later.

Now, on the island that had been so devastated by the horrific attack, I carried his memories with me as well as those of Warren and Betty Schott. The Schotts had quarters on Ford Island and were eyewitnesses to the attack.

When Derek and I walked through the entrance of the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center, I wanted nothing more than to talk to Betty, to tell her I was here. But Betty passed away in July 2015.

At the center, we watched a short film featuring actual footage of the attack. A scene of sailors and soldiers pulling the wounded and dead from the harbor made me gasp. That’s what Warren had done in the aftermath – it was the one thing he didn’t want to discuss with me over the course of many interviews. It was the only thing he refused to speak of with his wife of 76 years. Now, watching the footage through tear-filled eyes, I finally understood why he was loath to speak of it.

That horror was also all too real for my friend Ray Daves. During the attack, he hustled to a rooftop and handed ammo to two sailors who were manning a .30-caliber machine gun. He had his own brush with death when a Japanese plane exploded 20 feet from that rooftop before crashing into the sea below. His left hand was lacerated by shrapnel.

Like Warren Schott, Ray spent time pulling wounded men from the harbor, his blood mingling with the red splashes in the water around him. In his biography, “Radioman,”he described the bodies and body parts floating in the harbor. “We had to push them aside to get to the wounded,” he said.

Despite those gruesome memories, what really choked him up was recalling the bombing of the USS Arizona.

“My friend George Maybee was on the Arizona,” Ray said. “We’d gone through radio school together. Sat beside each other every day and were bunkmates at night.”

Ray Daves

“My friend George Maybee was on the Arizona,” Ray said. “We’d gone through radio school together. Sat beside each other every day and were bunkmates at night.”

He watched as the Arizona burst into a huge fireball. He knew his friend was gone.

Over the years, Ray and I grew close. He reminded me so much of my dad. They were both from Arkansas and had joined the military seeking a way out of the poverty of the rural south. Both had tender hearts and shared a wickedly funny sense of humor.

The last time I spoke to Ray before his June 2011 death, I told him I longed to visit Pearl Harbor.

“George is there,” he said, his eyes filling.

“I’ll look for his name,” I said. “I’ll say a prayer.”

Ray took my hand. “You do that, sweetheart.”

Five years later, I boarded the boat that took us to the USS Arizona. As we stepped from the boat onto the memorial, the throng of tourists quieted. The only sound was the snapping of the flag in the wind and the clicking of cameras.

We were somber with the knowledge that we were standing on the final resting place of 1,102 of the 1,177 sailors and Marines killed on the Arizona.

A rainbow of undulating color in the water below caught my eye. Some 500,000 gallons of oil are still slowly seeping out of the ship’s submerged wreckage, and it continues to spill up to nine quarts into the harbor each day.

Slowly, I entered the shrine. A marble wall bearing the names of those entombed beneath us stretched out behind a velvet rope.

So. Many. Names.

Overwhelmed, I looked at Derek. “I’ll never find him,” I whispered.

The day had been overcast, but suddenly a shaft of sunlight illuminated the marble.

“There,” Derek said. “There he is – G.F. Maybee.”

Bowing my head, I wept for the sailor I’d never met and for my friend who knew and loved him.

The Patriot Guard Riders stood silently, their flags held aloft as a light rain fell at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Spokane Valley on Saturday.

They’d come to honor Charles Boyer, 95, who died April 15.

As a 21-year-old sailor stationed at Naval Air Station Kaneohe, Boyer had earned membership into an exclusive club: the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association.

Though he was an aviation machinist’s mate, Boyer was assigned to service and drive the Navy’s trucks at Kaneohe. The morning of Dec. 7, 1941, he’d just dropped off some sailors at church and was on his way back, when he saw several khaki-colored planes approaching fast and low.

In newspaper interviews, Boyer shared his memories of the horrific attack.

“I said, ‘Look at the show the Army’s putting on! Then I saw the big ol’ red meatballs on the wings of the plane and I said, ‘Army, hell!’ ” he recalled. “The planes were coming over us, shooting at us and dropping bombs.”

With the truck still moving, Boyer dove out and took shelter under another truck parked a few yards away.

He stayed under that truck until the enemy planes passed, then he ran to a large tin shed that served as a garage for the trucks at Kaneohe.

“Time seemed like forever,” he said. “I was pretty scared.”

He wasn’t the only one frightened. He told of a fellow sailor on guard duty who shot at a fence post. “He swore it moved,” he recalled, grinning.

But he didn’t smile when he talked about the results of the attack. Twenty Americans died on the base at Kaneohe that day, and as for the aircraft – “they did a hell of job,” Boyer said. “They got every warplane on Kaneohe.”

Four years and one day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, he married Irene Britton. They celebrated their 70th anniversary in December.

After 20 years, Boyer retired as a chief petty officer, but he couldn’t quite leave Navy life behind. He spent the next 22 years working in civil service for the Navy.

Upon moving to Spokane Valley in 1998, he joined the Lilac City Chapter of the national Pearl Harbor Survivors Association. He was especially close to fellow survivor John (Sid) Kennedy, whom he’d met in 1941 at aviation machinist school in San Diego. Later they were both sent to Kaneohe. Kennedy died July 7, 2015, and at his funeral Boyer told a friend, “I guess he went on ahead without me.”

At one time there were 125 active members of the Lilac City Chapter of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association. Only one, Ray Garland, 93, remains.

Garland attended Boyer’s funeral on Saturday.

“It’s kind of a lonely feeling,” he said.

Carol Edgemon Hipperson, author of the Ray Daves biography, “Radioman: An Eyewitness Account of Pearl Harbor and World War II in the Pacific,” also feels Boyer’s loss keenly.

“Charlie was much like Ray Daves to me,” she said. “Of all the Pearl Harbor survivors those two were the ones most like my own father: kind, gentle, soft-spoken, humble, voracious readers, towering intellects.”

She admired his cheerful spirit and compassion.

“Most people get cranky when they don’t feel well or things don’t go right. Charlie never did. It was just his nature to smile and speak softly to everyone around him.”

Boyer’s son, Steve, agreed.

Three weeks ago as his father signed papers for hospice care, Steve Boyer choked up. His dad noticed his distress and said, “Don’t feel bad. I’ve had a great life – and a very, very long life.”

While many knew Charlie Boyer as a Pearl Harbor survivor, to his son, he was just Dad.

“I didn’t even know he was a Pearl Harbor survivor until he moved to Spokane Valley,” he said. “He never talked about it. He was just my dad and always will be. I’m going to miss him.”

I knew I was in trouble when I read the sign for Ford Island and starting crying.After many years of interviewing and writing about Pearl Harbor Survivors I was for the first time, walking where they walked.

My husband and I were celebrating our 30th anniversary on Oahu and Pearl Harbor was one of our first stops.

I pictured Warren’s desperate drive to get his wife to safety. They’d spoken of shrapnel falling from the skies– of the road shredded by machine gun fire– of the terror and the noise.

We watched a short film featuring actual footage of the attack. A scene of sailors and soldiers pulling the wounded and dead from the Harbor made me gasp. That’s what Warren had done in the aftermath– it was the one thing he didn’t want to discuss with me over the course of many interviews. It was the only thing he refused to speak of with his wife and best friend of 76 years.

As we boarded the boat that took us to the USS Arizona, I thought of Pearl Harbor Survivor Ray Daves, who died in 2011. His friend George Maybee perished aboard the Arizona. His remains are entombed in the waters below the memorial. The throng of tourists quieted. The only sound was the snapping of the flag in the wind as I found Maybee’s name among the more than 1,000 names engraved. I wished I could tell Ray.

All of the stories, all of the interviews over the years in no way prepared me for the magnitude, the solemness of this sacred place.

Remember Pearl Harbor. Indeed, I will never forget this place, these people, their sacrifice.

Here are links some of the stories I’ve written about those who survived the Day That Will Live in Infamy.

For our family Memorial Day has always meant more than a three-day weekend. The holiday used to be called Decoration Day and that’s what we still honor. We deocrate the graves of my father and father-in-law and pause to remember those who gave their lives in service to their country.

Of the men I interviewed for this 2007 story, only two remain.
I’m forever grateful for being able to share their stories.
“We all lost friends at Pearl Harbor,” Daves said. “We don’t need Memorial Day. We remember our friends – every day.”
For those who have no graves to visit– who don’t have family members who served their country- please tell your children what this day really means and allow yourself to be grateful for those who paid the price for your three-day weekend.

In 2010, I accompanied a group of Pearl Harbor Survivors during an annual Armed Forces parade in my hometown. The reaction of the crowd to this small group of heros showed me just how much Americans value the men and women who served our country during WWII and solidified my desire to write War Bonds.

Here’s the column I wrote about that event. Ray Daves, Cindy Hval and Denis Mikkelsen

When I received an invitation to appear in this year’s Armed Forces Torchlight Parade, I had mixed feelings. My only previous parade experience hadn’t gone well.

In seventh grade I rode on our church youth group’s float in Moses Lake. The theme? Daniel in the Lion’s Den. I had a major crush on the guy chosen to be Daniel, so I agreed to ride on the float. I pictured myself as one of the angels sent by God to shut the lions’ mouths. Instead, they made me a lion, complete with furry suit and painted-on whiskers. My mane was made of cardboard, and I kept poking my fellow feline’s eyes with every turn of my head.

Did you know Moses Lake gets very warm in the spring? I sizzled and sweated through the parade and my black whiskers ran like polluted rain down my cheeks. Then I started sneezing. The “den” was made out of hay bales, those being plentiful in Moses Lake. That’s how I found out I’m allergic to hay. By the end of the parade my eyes were swollen shut, and “Daniel” hadn’t even noticed me growling at his feet.

However, the Torchlight parade would be different. The theme was “Freedom is not Free,” and instead of a float made of hay bales I’d been ask to accompany the Pearl Harbor survivors on a military truck. I’ve written several stories about these incredible folks over the years, and they’ve kind of adopted me. I was so honored by the invitation, I would have said yes even if they wanted me to wear a lion costume.

So on parade day, I boarded the truck with five Pearl Harbor survivors ranging in age from 86 to 93. Among them: Warren and Betty Schott, who were both on Ford Island when the bombs began to fall.

Denis Mikkelsen who was sleeping aboard the USS West Virginia and woke to the sound of chaos. When the order came to abandon ship he dived into the harbor.

Sid Kennedy at the Naval Air Station Kaneohe, watched the planes swoop in. “Look at the show the Army’s putting on,” he’d said. Then he saw the red circles on the aircrafts’ wings.

And Ray Daves was on his way to breakfast when he looked up to see the first bomb hit Ford Island. He prayed, “God, don’t let it get my friend, Jim.”

The memories of Dec. 7, 1941, are seared into the minds of this small band of survivors. Each year their number dwindles, yet those who are able agree to appear in the parade, not for cheers or accolades, but to honor the thousands of Americans who did not survive the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Joining us on the truck were the survivor’s family escorts and Jean Flechel, widow of a Pearl Harbor survivor. The sun warmed us as we waited for the start of the parade and at last we began our slow trek through city streets.

Much has been said and written about the decline of patriotism in America and how younger generations don’t seem to honor the flag and our country the way our forebears did.

This may be true, but it certainly wasn’t what I observed that night. Almost without exception men, women and children leapt to their feet as our truck went by. Teenage boys took off their ball caps, men saluted or put their hands over their hearts and the applause was deafening. Amid the clapping I heard shouts of, “God bless you!” and “We love you,” but mostly what I heard were these words shouted over and over again: “Thank you! Thank you for your service.”

I heard teenage girls scream as if Justin Bieber was in town. I watched grown men weep and small children wave and clap while others stood somberly at attention as the truck passed.

Some may believe our country has lost its way and its citizens no longer value the tenets upon which our nation was built. But what I experienced in the company of American heroes that night, filled me with hope.